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Animal Trafficking and Trade: Abuse and Species Injustice

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Emerging Issues in Green Criminology

Part of the book series: Critical Criminological Perspectives ((CCRP))

Abstract

The illegal wildlife1 trade is estimated to be the second-largest illegal trade worldwide (Warchol, 2007; Zimmerman, 2003; South and Wyatt, 2011), and it is steadily increasing (for example Smith, 2010; Stoett, 2002; Traffic, 2008), due to a globalised and expanded market in which the World Wide Web plays a significant role as an intermediary between offers and demands (IFAW, 2008). The illegal wildlife trade threatens one third of the world’s species (Rivalan et al., 2007); the best-known species are the rhinoceros (for its horn) and the elephant (for its tusks) (Wasser, Clark and Laurie, 2009). In this chapter, I will first give a brief overview of the phenomenon, with a special focus on the parrot and reptile trades. Then I will show how a Norwegian case study reflects international findings and how the trade in endangered species in this country may be related to the international market. As reptiles are forbidden in Norway, this provides an interesting case for discussing problems of legalisation and regulation of the trade through the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna (CITES Convention) versus criminalisation. Finally, I will discuss the trade in nonhuman species from a harm and justice perspective.

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Authors
  1. Ragnhild Sollund
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Research for the Faculty of Law at Queensland, University of Technology, Australia

    Reece Walters (Assistant Dean) (Assistant Dean)

  2. Independent Scholar, Australia

    Diane Solomon Westerhuis

  3. Northumbria University, UK

    Tanya Wyatt (Senior Lecturer in Criminology) (Senior Lecturer in Criminology)

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© 2013 Ragnhild Sollund

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Sollund, R. (2013). Animal Trafficking and Trade: Abuse and Species Injustice. In: Walters, R., Westerhuis, D.S., Wyatt, T. (eds) Emerging Issues in Green Criminology. Critical Criminological Perspectives. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137273994_5

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